Kelowna lumber, Kelowna Sawmill.

Labour Contract 1967 to 1970, Collective Agreement between Comet Construction and Locals 1405 & 1423.

Labour Union - Promotion notices, LOA notices, Plant Committee Roster, Safety Mtg. Minutes, Sound Level Survey, and Seniority List.

Certificate of history of incorporation of sawmills with record of purchase and renaming to Crown Zellerbach Canada Ltd.

Bulletin & copy tearsheet.

Subseries consists of records pertaining to the legal history of incorporation of the companies Crown Zellerbach Canada subsumed in 1965, including S.M. Simpson Ltd.

Correspondence re: grievances, wages, worker category lists, seniority lists, completed job applications, memorandum of agreement re: apprentice training program.

Includes interior mill, exterior forestry management, maps, exterior mill, trucks.

Contact images of mill scenes.

Featuring banquet on Jan 30, 1970.

Contains Modernization Program plan, "About Crown Zellerbach" hand written notes, policy documents.

Subseries consists of documentation of Crown Zellerbach Canada’s interactions with its workers, as well as their labour union, the International Woodworkers’ Association.
Subseries contains primary instance documents including forms (blank and completed), collective agreements, meeting minutes, seniority lists, job categorization lists, correspondence, committee rosters, contracts, bulletins, etc.

Bound volume of land titles documenting changes in ownership.

Binder containing profiles of production/operation sites incl. Knox Mtn., Kelowna Sawmill, Kelowna Plywood, Bear Creek Ranch, Monte Lake, Falkland Sawmill, Armstrong Plywood, Armstrong Sawmill, Enderby Sawmill, Lumby Sawmill, with mill stats; profiles typical tree stands, logging operations, describes tree licenses in detail.

Photos, minutes, photo ID sheet.

Includes 18 photographs depicting box factory demolition in the 1970s.

Subseries is comprised of documentation of Crown Zellerbach Canada’s (Southern Interior Wood Products) safety program.

Contact images of mill scenes.

Scenes at Enderby, Armstrong, Kelowna including work candids and mill scenes.

Subseries consists of photographs created or acquired by Crown Zellerbach Canada Ltd. This aggregation consists of photographs concerning the former S.M. Simpson Ltd. mills as well as other mills purchased by Crown Zellerbach Canada at the same time.
The majority of these images are contact prints of aerial photographs from commercial photography studios, commissioned by Crown Zellerbach Canada:
Hans Giesen of British Columbia Ltd.
Jennings Ltd. Photography
Images depict sites, workers, events, processes, and capital projects at Crown Zellerbach mills, including those holdings in Enderby, Armstrong, Falkland, Monte Lake, Lumby, and Kelowna.

Subseries consists of partial documentation of the substantial forestry, logging, and sawmill operations conducted by Crown Zellerbach Canada (Southern Interior Wood Products) during the 1960s through 1980s. Predominantly, this subseries is comprised of prepared reports, prospectuses, industrial profiles, and descriptions of assets, work processes, and mill specifications.

Series is comprised of documentary record generated by the business activities of Crown Zellerbach Canada Ltd (Southern Interior Wood Products) which purchased the business holdings of S.M. Simpson Ltd. in 1965. Series also includes older materials from mills acquired at the same time as S.M. Simpson Ltd., but which were not affiliated with S.M. Limited during its active existence, namely Lumby Sawmill.
For several years after the acquisition of S.M.S. Ltd., those holdings taken over from S.M. Simpson Ltd. were referred to the S.M. Simpson Ltd. Division of Crown Zellerbach Canada.
In 1973, the name was changed to Crown Zellerbach Canada, and the corporation embarked on a modernization program, documented in this series. In 1981, it was purchased by Fletcher Challenge Canada Ltd. and the company name was changed to Crown Forest.
Series contains documentation of sawmills located in Kelowna, Lumby, Enderby, Armstrong, Falkland, and Monte Lake, British Columbia.
Series within this sous fonds continue at 2.1.3.

Contains duo tang folder with map, itinerary.

Contains some oversized photos described as part of box 1 and three folders of various copied photographs, predominantly on tabloid sized paper. Contains approximately 42 b&w photographic prints larger than 25cmx20cm or mounted in album larger than 25x20cm, and approximately 80 photocopied photographs on tabloid sized paper.

Retrospective historical administrative sketch by S.M. Simpson Ltd. successor.

Notes etc. generated by H.B. Simpson.

Series consists of partial record of operations of Fletcher Challenge Canada Ltd, which purchased Crown Zellerbach in 1981 with coverage of safety programs and vendor relations. This subseries is predominantly photographic.
This corporate entity did business as Crown Forest from 1981 to 1987 following its purchase from Crown Zellerbach. After 1987, the name of the entity was changed to Fletcher Challenge Canada Ltd.

Administrative history
The Simpson family fonds is primarily a compilation of the images and records of three corporate entities, (Kelowna Sawmill Ltd., S.M. Simpson Ltd., S & K Ltd.) as well as the records and images of S. M. Simpson’s sole proprietorship between 1913 – 1924, prior to the incorporation of S. M. Simpson Ltd.

The Kelowna Sawmill dates from 1892 when it was first established by Bernard Lequime, who subsequently sold it to David Lloyd-Jones in 1901. Lloyd-Jones had a variety of business partners during the time he owned the sawmill. In 1942, Stanley M. Simpson, the owner of S. M. Simpson Ltd., purchased and operated the Kelowna Sawmill until it was destroyed by fire in 1944. The corporate Kelowna Sawmill Ltd. was maintained and became the retail arm of S. M. Simpson Ltd. until 1956, when retail operations ceased.
Stanley M. Simpson arrived in Kelowna in 1913 and operated a sole proprietorship for the next eleven years (1913-1924) until incorporating S. M. Simpson Ltd. in 1924. During those early years, Simpson operated his business in two different downtown locations, as well as running, or partnering in various portable sawmills throughout the area. His sash and door factory on Abbott Street, manufactured and sold windows and doors, custom furniture, and wooden fruit boxes for the expanding Okanagan fruit and vegetable industry. The business operated out of this location until 1948.
Needing a reliable and accessible source of logs, Stanley Simpson bought land at Manhattan Beach along the lakeshore, in Kelowna’s North End. In 1930, he began constructing a sawmill and box factory and three years later, added a veneer plant to the site.

The Province of British Columbia created Forest Management licenses in 1951, when S. M. Simpson Ltd. was awarded Tree Farm License #9. Needing to diversity, S. M. Simpson Ltd. created S&K Ltd. to add a plywood manufacturing facility to the Manhattan site. It began operations in 1957.

In the following years S. M. Simpson Ltd. purchased other sawmills and logging operations, including Trautman Garraway in Peachland (1955), Peachland Sawmill & Box (1955), McLean Sawmills (1957), Lumby Timber Co (1959), Ferguson Brothers Lumber (1962), Stave Lumber (1962) Eagle Pass Lumber (1963), R&L Lumber (1964).
Stanley Simpson died in 1959. Horace B. Simpson, Stanley’s son, managed S. M. Simpson Ltd. until 1965 when the company was sold to Crown Zellerbach, Canada. A branch operation of the U.S. company, this was the first of a succession of owners, and though the Simpson name was attached to the operations for several years, the family was no longer involved.

In 1965, H.B. Simpson sold S.M.S. Ltd and its several associates and subsidiaries to the Canadian instance of Crown Zellerbach Corporation: Crown Zellerbach Canada. It continued operating as the S.M. Simpson Division of Crown Zellerbach Canada for several years until the name was changed to simply Crown Zellerbach Canada. In 1969, Crown Zellerbach purchased several more sawmills in the region, including Armstrong Sawmills operations in Armstrong, Enderby, Vernon and Falkland, as well as Ponderosa Pine Lumber Co. in 1970.

In 1981 Crown Zellerbach Canada was purchased by Fletcher Challenge Canada Ltd. and the entity’s name was changed to Crown Forest, and in 1987 the name changed again to Fletcher Challenge Canada Ltd. The company was then subsequently purchased by Riverside Forest Products in 1992. In 2004 Riverside Forest Products was purchased by Tolko Industries Ltd. which operated until 2020.

Scope and content
The sous fonds includes records generated by Stanley Merriam Simpson both before and after the corporate life of S.M. Simpson Ltd., and additionally documents a suite of succeeding companies that assumed the business operations and assets established by S.M. Simpson.

The sous fonds consists of a photographic record that documents the wood processing entity established by S.M. Simpson across iterations of corporate ownership, as well as business records relating to substantial operations, labour relations, safety programs, legal proceedings, and administration.

The sous fonds consists of a photographic record that documents the wood processing entity established by S.M. Simpson across iterations of corporate ownership, as well as business records relating to substantial operations, labour relations, safety programs, legal proceedings, and administration.

The fonds consists of two separate streams of documentation. The first consists of documents, photographs, and artifacts pertaining to the operations of a succession of sawmills and wood manufacturing plants founded by Stanley Merriam Simpson) and assumed by his son, Horace B. Simpson in the Okanagan area.
The second stream consists of the materials generated by Sharron J. Simpson, a Kelowna author, publisher, and activist. Sharron J. Simpson's records within this aggregation are primarily in relation to legal proceedings against the City of Kelowna in pursuit of the maintenance of the Simpson Covenant, which limits use of waterfront land on a former mill site sold by S.M. Simpson to the City under restrictive terms of sale in 1946. In the 2000s, the City sought to dissolve the Covenant; Sharron J. Simpson founded a society to challenge this initiative.
In total fonds consists of approximately 2,642 photographs, in various forms, including some duplicates. Records provide documentation of legal proceedings, finances, substantial mill operations, safety initiatives, administration, civic engagement, publicity, and labour relations relating to mill business, general family research, and writing samples. Artifacts include exemplars of production and souvenir materials.

Various collected accounts of S.M. Simpson Ltd., from the 1980s and 1990s.

Miscellaneous collected documents from the Sharron J. Simpson sous fonds. Includes a map, funeral program, some copied clippings, handwritten notes of unknown context, OHS report #23 report on population of Okanagan cities, ILMA directory, KPMG Forest Industry Update, and 2 souvenir calendars.

1999 reunion.

1999 reunion. Includes index and some negatives.

1999 reunion. Includes negatives and index.

Clippings, copied tear sheets, computer printouts.